This invention relates generally to semiconductor structures and devices and to a method for their fabrication, and more specifically to semiconductor structures and devices and to the fabrication and use of semiconductor structures, devices, and integrated circuits that include a substrate having a graded monocrystalline layer to facilitate growth of monocrystalline material on the substrate.
Semiconductor devices often include multiple layers of conductive, insulating, and semiconductive layers. Often, the desirable properties of such layers improve with the crystallinity of the layer. For example, the electron mobility and band gap of semiconductive layers improves as the crystallinity of the layer increases. Similarly, the free electron concentration of conductive layers and the electron charge displacement and electron energy recoverability of insulative or dielectric films improves as the crystallinity of these layers increases.
For many years, attempts have been made to grow various monocrystalline thin films on a foreign substrate such as silicon (Si). To achieve optimal characteristics of the various monocrystalline layers, however, a monocrystalline film of high crystalline quality is desired. Attempts have been made, for example, to grow various monocrystalline layers on a substrate such as germanium, silicon, and various insulators. These attempts have generally been unsuccessful because lattice mismatches between the host crystal and the grown crystal have caused the resulting layer of monocrystalline material to be of low crystalline quality.
If a large area thin film of high quality monocrystalline material was available at low cost, a variety of semiconductor devices could advantageously be fabricated in or using that film at a low cost compared to the cost of fabricating such devices beginning with a bulk wafer of the monocrystalline material. In addition, if a thin film of high quality monocrystalline material could be realized beginning with a bulk wafer such as a silicon wafer, an integrated device structure could be achieved that took advantage of the best properties of both the silicon and the high quality monocrystalline material.
Accordingly, a need exists for a semiconductor structure that provides a high quality monocrystalline film or layer over another monocrystalline material and for a process for making such a structure. In other words, there is a need for providing the formation of a monocrystalline substrate that is compliant with a high quality monocrystalline material layer so that true two-dimensional growth can be achieved for the formation of semiconductor structures, devices and integrated circuits formed using the high-quality monocrystalline material layer grown on the compliant substrate. This grown monocrystalline material layer may be comprised of a semiconductor material, a compound semiconductor material, and other types of material such as metals.